This project will create a digital photo‐archive of images taken during the
construction of the transcontinental railway in the 1860s, and focusses on one of four bodies of images
(photographs by Andrew J. Russell), one of four photographers commissioned by the railroad
companies. The majority of these images (nearly 1300 in all four bodies, approximately 240‐260 in the
body this project will work with) are not posted online. Recently, since this proposal was completed,
Yale libraries put online 100 or so images from its archives, but none are full negative prints, and the
numbers and labels do not coincide with the original glass negatives. The project team has digitized
close to 200 images made from the original glass plate negatives. These negatives make up the
collection of the Oakland Museum in California. A complete collection of these images does not exist in
a single location. The location of some images is not known, thus the website will have a public
component – to solicit images from collectors and train enthusiasts, as well as to promote a dialogue
about the images, the railroad, and civil war era photography. It will be housed in the UFDC and
moderated by UF professor of art history Glenn Willumson. With the launching of this website the team
will apply for external funding to seek out the images in the other three sets to add to the archive,
creating, for the first time the complete collection in a single location where scholars and enthusiasts
can study and compare the entire body of these important historical images.